I am 15 chapters ahead on my patreón, check it out if you are interested.
https://www.patréon.com/emperordragon
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The school day trudged forward with the slow, grinding resistance of wet cement being dragged uphill.
Each class blurred into the next, a monotonous loop of lectures, whiteboard scribbles, and the faint scratching of pens. I sat at my desk like a well-trained puppet—spine straight, eyes locked on the board, nodding when appropriate, jotting down notes when it was expected. On the surface, I played the part perfectly. But inside, my thoughts were miles away. No, not even miles—worlds away.
Because my mind wasn't anchored to this classroom, or even to this version of Beacon Hills. It had drifted someplace else. Somewhere familiar yet undeniably foreign.
The version of reality I knew from memory—the version that aired on TV, playing out in seasons and episodes, with scripted arcs and prewritten fates.
This place, the one I'd lived in for sixteen years, shared so much with that fictional world—names, locations, faces—but it was like looking at a reflection in broken glass. The pieces resembled the whole, but they didn't line up. The cracks ran deep.
Take Malia, for example. On the show, she was a werecoyote—an uncommon shapeshifter, part wild animal, haunted by trauma and years lost in the woods. A survivor, unpredictable and raw. But the girl sitting next to me now, tapping her pen against her notebook and chewing the cap like it held the answers to our geometry problems?
She was a werewolf. Through and through. No trace of coyote in her blood, her aura, or her scent. Her supernatural signature was unmistakably lupine. No feral edge, no hybrid vibration humming beneath the surface. Just a typical, textbook young werewolf. Strong, sure. But familiar in a way Malia never was.
And that was only the beginning of the discrepancies.
In this world, a lot of what I remembered from the show didn't line up with what I knew from experience. Creatures that don't exist. Events that should've happened haven't. Or maybe won't. Or maybe they never will.
There are no werecoyotes in this world. No Kanima. I've never once seen a kitsune, and if there's a Nogitsune lurking around, it's doing a hell of a job staying quiet.
Instead, what I had seen were different shapeshifters. Established supernatural creatures operating under old-world rules. Rogue shapeshifters stalking the edges of town. Corrupted creatures with strange abilities and stranger activities. Hunter cells embedded deep, watching, waiting. And systems—actual, logical systems—governing how the supernatural operated.
In this world, things didn't revolve around melodrama. They revolved around survival.
And in the middle of it all, there was me.
Which meant I existed on a different frequency altogether. Most supernatural beings projected their power like a siren—loud, demanding, impossible to ignore. But me? My presence was quiet. A hum beneath the static. Like the deep current in a still river, unseen unless I wanted it to be.
And thankfully that meant Malia couldn't sense me.
I glanced at the clock above the whiteboard. Ten minutes left until lunch.
Outside, the sun cast slanted light across the hallway floors. Inside, everything felt suspended. Unreal. Like I was walking through someone else's memory, only the details had been rearranged.
The bell rang, finally, a shrill chime that shattered the silence of my thoughts.
I slipped my phone from my pocket as I walked, thumb flying across the screen. My message was short but encrypted to my contact in the Association.
Need a full pull on Beacon Hills. Names, factions, known entities. Flag anything out of the ordinary.
I hit send before sliding the phone away and stepping into the crowded hallway. I wasn't hungry but I figured food would help.
The lunchroom buzzed with the chaotic energy of too many teenagers trapped in one place. Laughter echoed off the walls. A tray clattered to the floor. Someone shouted across the room for ketchup.
I weaved through the chaos, my tray in hand—chicken sandwich, a pile of fries, and a plastic container of something vaguely fruit-shaped.
She was sitting at a table near the center of the cafeteria with Lydia Martin, Jackson Whittemore, and the rest of their model-student entourage. She was laughing at something Lydia said, sipping from her water bottle was all perfectly normal.
Because even as she laughed, her eyes scanned the room. Constantly. Subtly. Like a trained soldier on rotation, alert and aware beneath the surface.
Allison carried the Hunter's Mark already. That wasn't supposed to happen.
They were still nowhere to be found.
I lowered my tray onto an empty table near the edge of the lunchroom, far from the noise and the cliques. My appetite was a no-show, but I forced myself to pick up the sandwich anyway.
Everything felt wrong.
That's when Jenny dropped into the seat across from me like it was her throne and she'd just claimed her kingdom.
"I'm eating with you today," she announced, unwrapping a granola bar with flair.
I blinked. "How generous of you, Aunt Jenny."
She grinned, bright and shameless. "It's your first day. I figured you'd need a friendly face. Plus, let's be honest, I'm probably already your favorite Lockwood."
I smirked despite myself. "Not even pretending to be modest, huh?"
"Please. Humility is for people who aren't fabulous."
She popped the granola bar into her mouth, legs swinging slightly under the table like the teenager she actually was. Meanwhile, the noise of the lunchroom buzzed around us, fading into the background.
For a moment, her chatter—something about a math quiz and someone named Brian being a total idiot—grounded me. Anchored me.
Made me feel like I wasn't drifting in some alternate timeline without a map.
I leaned back in my chair, the tension in my shoulders finally loosening.
"Thanks for sitting with me," I said quietly.
Jenny shrugged, clearly pleased. "Of course. I'm awesome like that."
I let myself smile, just a little, and glanced back across the room.
Allison still watched everything. Jackson was laughing too loudly. Lydia was texting under the table, her polished fingernails a blur.
And I still had no idea what game was being played.
And I wasn't planning to lose.